Sometimes when I open my phone there is a fic in it. This will be multi-chapter and is mostly done already, probably a short 5x2.5k. Is anyone still into Daiya these days? I remember seeing it everywhere in 2013 when I barely knew what anime was, and now...gone...like rain on the mountain...like wind in the meadow...
Raizou peered over the tops of his reading glasses at his pride and joy, his son, the most accomplished hitter in West Tokyo, curled up on the floor and cackling softly at his new phone.
"What've you got there?" he asked.
Lounging back on the knotted sock-and-tennis-ball combo that was their physiotherapist, Raichi didn't even bother to look at him.
"Mn, Sawamura wants to go running next weekend."
The phone was turning out better than he'd feared. He couldn't exactly refuse when that Amahisa kid showed up on the doorstep with a cosmetics gift bag and a refurbished Samsung. Who knew high school kids could earn that much? Geez, it was all he could do to foot the prepaid plan that kept Raichi going with fifteen minutes per month.
But, well, life was different now from when he was a kid. Even though Raichi still could barely look his own classmates in the eye, he didn't seem to have any problem fielding the barrage of dings and buzzes that came from his pet pitchers, as Raizou was starting to think of them.
Not to mention the noise from Akiba and Yuuta. Those three played from morning to night together and then took the train home, what the hell else could they have to talk about? He wasn't about to guess.
"Don't go skipping out on practice," he said. "Just because it's fall doesn't mean we can relax. You got the retirement game coming up, don't you?"
Raichi sat bolt upright and glared, chucking the tennis ball sock at his head. It was a fine pitch that ricocheted off the wall of the rental unit as he dodged, putting another dent in the drywall that had long since lost him his deposit.
"You shouldn't lock up your own son! We're going on Sunday anyway, bastard!"
"Amahisa, too?" he asked, flipping over the sheet. You could get a newspaper subscription for darn cheap, if you could just deal with it a day late. He could usually scrounge the morning edition from the neighbourhood recycling bins at night.
"Yeah!" Raichi grinned enthusiastically. "We're going to see who goes for longer!"
So the phone had turned out well for Raichi, since he'd found a way around actually talking to people, and it'd turned out better for Amahisa. Raizou hadn't expected the kid who broke his boy's heart and locked him out of a pay rise to become a household name. Now, here they were.
"Don't run more than ten kilometres, I don't trust you to hold back against those guys. Sawamura's coach probably told him the same thing," he said placatingly.
"Come on! I can beat him in less than that, ahahaha."
"What about Amahisa, huh?" asked Raizou. "He beat you the last time."
"Yeah," Raichi said fondly, "I'd definitely beat him this year. I'm going to kill him in the pros."
His son flopped back on to the badly-carpeted floor of their studio, basking in the sun from the one window like a cat and stabbing his thumbs into his phone screen.
Yep, Amahisa was firmly back in Raichi's good books with his donation. If a rich kid wanted to waste his allowance, Raizou wasn't going to stop him. He wasn't a threat anymore. Though, he did wonder sometimes how their own ace felt about Raichi cozying up to that guy. Not Yuuta, no, Yuuta earned his spot as starting pitcher, but he definitely didn't stand a chance against the likes of Sawamura or Narumiya when it came to the title. Ace.
It was hard to picture anyone else once that kid had worn the number.
"Fine. Don't give away any data," he said, like Raichi didn't text Sawamura every free hour of his life. "You want this back?"
Raizou tossed the tennis balls over without waiting for an answer, which Raichi caught left-handed.
"Shut up! I know, idiot."
Yeah, he did wonder if Sanada knew that Ichidaisan's ace was the one always prancing around their conversations these days.
Raizou shifted at the beaten-up dining table that was his desk and sometimes his pillow. He'd kept up once or twice with the third-years, once they stopped coming to practice, but he was an old man. He was just glad to hear they were settled. They weren't interested in emailing some old fogey who only used his laptop to check the weather forecast.
Sanada had found his spot like the rest of them.
After a lot of flip-flopping, most of which happened in Raizou's office, he ended up at university. No sports scholarship. But, on condition that his leg healed up all right, he had the promise of funding in second-year. Admissions had also let him in with an average that wasn't what you'd expect from a school that big. He was doing well in the months since he joined. He was already doing partial practice with the university team, and the coach there promised that his physical was spotless.
Now Raichi had turned over, holding the plank casually while he giggled under his breath. It did him good to watch his kids in the bloom of youth. He wished his earplugs weren't over on the bathroom counter.
While he was sure Sanada landed in his feet, he couldn't be so sure what he was thinking about it all. The kid was too mature for his age. He couldn't just ask how things were going, or he'd be the prying adult and all he'd get was a polite damn response. It was a pain having that niggling at the back of his mind. How'd Sanada like it there? Was he…happy? Did he feel like Raizou has just set him up for failure, playing him like that on an injury, was he glad to be out of it?
Glancing over, Raizou saw his son turning red in the face as circulation started to become an issue. He'd still hold that posture for ten minutes, panting as the blood forced its way into his fingers.
As far as he knew, Sanada never contacted Raichi after he graduated. He did tell Raizou to say 'hi' when he emailed, and promised to come to practice with Hirahata and the others over New Years'. Raizou found himself wondering about that, as well.
"Say, you heard from Sanada?"
With a squawk and a tumble, Raichi collapsed on himself. The phone skidded off into the opposite wall
"I—eh—uh—" Raichi's jaw moved like it usually did when he was asked to speak. No quick insults now.
"'S fine, I was wondering. Kid never emails me back. That brat," he said, for show.
Raichi bit his lip. He stared at him with a pained expression that Raizou never knew what to do with.
"Go get your phone," he said. "Sawamura's wondering what happened to you, I bet."
"Uh. Yeah. I—yeah."
Awkwardly scrambling, Raichi put himself back into the elbow plank. He was red as fake crab sticks.
"There you go," Raizou said.
So that was that.
Turning the next leaf, Raizou gave up on actually reading the news.
It was natural for kids in different grades to fall out of contact after school. Knowing Raichi, though, Raizou didn't want to draw attention to his favourite upperclassman if he'd already forgotten. Best he kept this 'group chat' thing going with his new friends and didn't get hung up.
While they were playing, Raizou reflected, he did get too comfortable entrusting Raichi to him. Sanada was just another kid. He'd been using him as a vice-coach-slash-babysitter. It had worked damn well, too, which was a shame. Yuuta was useless at teaching anybody anything. Akiba could've done it, but he had his hands full keeping Yuuta in check, and besides, Raizou didn't want to interfere in that relationship. Putting him above Raichi and Yuuta would've put some strain on the team at a critical moment.
So it was second nature to ask Sanada to keep an eye on his ptiching. Raichi adored him, he picked stuff up way quicker from kyou-Naada-senpai than anything Raizou told him. He thought it'd worked so well in that last game, when Raichi could go look for comfort and find it, with someone who actually knew what to do.
That was his mistake. He hadn't made Sanada a mentor like he thought. He'd saddled him with a dumb, loud, needy kid who he'd had to put up with for two years or risk getting on the coach's bad side. It didn't sit right with him. The pressure he'd put on Sanada, and the pain that gave to Raichi after their losing summer.
He put the newspaper down.
Would it kill the kid to text? There had to be someone he could get Raichi's LINE from. Didn't he know someone on the Seidou team from outside of school? Anyone?
But, he realized, as Raichi finally gave up the elbow plank and panted on the ground, it wasn't so bad as it could've been. Raichi had bounced back so well he didn't even think about it until now. He didn't get the same long, lonely spells that Raizou was used to when Akiba and Yuuta's families took them out to the countryside during break.
Raizou picked at the chipped varnish on the old wooden table.
Across the room, Raichi had flipped over into fetal position, still cradling his phone. He was about to have a thought he never could have seen coming.
Thank the gods for Amahisa.
He owed him.
…
Raichi loved the tingly feeling of blood flowing through his hands when they were numb.
Nada
you don't have a practice game this fall right?
Raichi
no („• ֊ •„) dad said we can play them after break
Nada
apparently Sawamura's super nasty with the new starting catcher
Raichi
yeah (((ꎤ๑‾᷅༬‾᷄๑)̂—̳͟͞͞o
Nada
think you're going to beat him?
Raichi
yeah (╯✧▽✧)╯
Nada
sure. i'll cheer for you guys
(^‿^) you need it
Raichi
you should come watch! Tell misshima everything he's doing wrong :DDDDD he sucks!
Nada
tell Coach to book it early. I can't come if I have to study lol
Raichi smirked. That was easy! His old man liked Sanada more than he liked him, if Raichi wanted to tell the truth. One word from him and it'd be done. He sat up, opened his mouth to yell—
And rolled back over on his other side on the carpet, sun crashing into his eyes. Stupid, stupid, stupid, he couldn't go and give Dad a message from Sanada when he just told him that he didn't talk to him. Maybe he could just leave it? But then Dad might have the Seidou game at the wrong time. Aaaagh! Raichi cursed to himself.
Raichi
you tell him! he says you never talk to him ahahahahaha
Nada
hey, i do! i'm just busy. tell him that?
Raichi
ahahahaha
Nada
o yeah sorry, i have to go
running
but it was nice talking!
btw what are doing next weekend?
Raichi
! running!
Nada
cool! i guess it's different from normal running~?
Raichi
yeah! Sawamura asked me and Amahisa-san (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
Nada
cool
kill them for me okay?
Raichi
( ˙꒳ ˙ )
Nada
actually
maybe not Amahisa
i owe him
even if he sucks
Raichi
but it's fun for him! i can't hit off him now! we're racing!
Nada
kk
then say hi for me!
have fun (๑˃ᴗ˂)ﻭ
i'll talk to you tonight?
Raichi
:D
Seeing the cheery sticker Sanada sent back, Raichi locked his phone and put it down on his chest so that he wouldn't crush it in his fists.
Man, it was cool! Sanada always seemed like he was sort of another coach in high school, getting on his case about fielding and everything, but Raichi was talking to him like a friend now, and he was still answering.
He didn't know how Sanada got his LINE still. Sawamura said that probably he heard about it from someone who heard about it from his bastard ex-captain, the one who beat Amahisa, who couldn't use a phone but who was friends with that shortstop with the good legs, who Sawamura said had no sense of privacy or personal space and kept going through his phone even after he graduated. Raichi didn't care. It meant that Sanada wanted to talk to him. Not just his stupid dad.
Pulling himself up to his feet, Raichi sat in an air chair while he calmed down. The burn in his thighs made him feel more evened out, with his face and stomach already on fire.
He didn't get why Sanada didn't ask him, though. Sanada came by their place a lot when he was in school. If he just took the train here, he wouldn't need to go through all those people. Even Amahisa-san did it!
So it felt like a secret. Raichi wasn't the smartest. He wasn't as dumb as everyone thought, either. Sanada didn't want Dad to know that he was talking to Raichi like this. He didn't want anyone on the team to know either, or he'd text them as a group. Maybe he was embarrassed that he was still talking to Raichi. Definitely, Raichi knew that was probably what it was, except, if Sanada didn't want to be talking to him, he could just talk to him less.
Raichi squeezed his fists around the thought. Sanada talked to him, and he talked to Sanada, and no one could listen to them or make fun of him, as long as nobody else knew. Which meant that he wasn't just doing it to suck up to the Coach. As long as Dad didn't know about it, then that meant Sanada had to be doing it because he wanted to.
That's why Raichi was going to keep this secret for now. It was stupid. He knew, but it was the only thing he could do. There weren't any secrets he'd really had to keep before, because he never did anything except baseball, and because it was impossible to hide anything in a sixty-square-metre studio anyway. So he was going to try it this once. It didn't have to be forever, he just had to hold on until…
Until what?
Raichi kicked up out of the pose just before he fainted and stretched. The sun still felt warm in their unheated apartment, enough that he wasn't about to move into the shadow even to sit on the old loveseat. He'd just stand in front of the window as close as he could manage.
That was the hard part. Sanada was at university while he was going pro. Because he had to, but also because there was nothing else he wanted to do more than hit until his arms gave out. The money was just to make sure Dad didn't have to sleep in his clothes anymore.
What was there to wait for? In four years maybe, maybe Sanada would get drafted too. Was it that?
If he didn't, then it didn't matter.
Raichi was never going to play with him again. So he had to keep it secret for…ever.
Not forever, just for ever. If somebody else knew then Sanada wasn't talking to him anymore. He was just babysitting his dumb coach's dumb kid. Never mind that he was going to be old enough to drink. There wasn't anything tying them together but this.
So Raichi had to wait and hold on to it until he didn't want to have Sanada be his any more. Which was something that wasn't going to happen probably until he died, he had decided in fall of first year.
He glanced at Dad again. Sitting at the dining room table with half its stain scraped off, staring at the greasy newspaper, wearing two sweaters and wool socks inside his slippers. He didn't look like he'd noticed anything.
Raichi snickered to himself. He didn't know that Sawamura only texted them once a week when he was feeling really excited, that somebody else was pitching curves into Raichi's chest. The way Dad was cleaning his ear out, he didn't have enough brains to guess. Which was good. Because Raichi was going to have to wait a long time like this.
Sitting back down on the floor, he stretched his legs out.
"Dad! Get over here, I need to stretch."
"Don't yell, I keep telling you! You want the neighbours to start sticking their nose in here?"
Grumbling the whole way, Dad at least did as he was told.
Anyway! any and all comments or typos-pointed-out are appreciated. the phone thing may seem far-fetched, but it is based off of a true story that happened with a classmate!